


i'm forever chasing after time

by flashlightinacave



Category: Never Have I Ever (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst, Banter, Bickering, F/M, Fluff, Kissing, Love Confessions, Mutual Pining, Pining, Time Loop
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-14
Updated: 2020-08-14
Packaged: 2021-03-06 04:21:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 17,380
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25887253
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flashlightinacave/pseuds/flashlightinacave
Summary: Suddenly Devi feels a little dizzy, a little lightheaded, a little faint. Like she’s been sucked into a spinning vortex or a whirlpool.She slowly begins to put the pieces together. If yesterday was the 23rd, and today is also the 23rd, then that means she’s reliving it.(She feels butterflies brush their wings against her stomach.)She’s reliving September 23rd.Which can mean only one thing.She’s developed real feelings for her soulmate.or; Devi knows the only way to get out of this time loop is if she kisses her soulmate. She's cool with it. She's got a plan. Problem is, she has no idea what to do when that plan doesn't work out.
Relationships: Ben Gross/Devi Vishwakumar
Comments: 62
Kudos: 162





	i'm forever chasing after time

**Author's Note:**

  * For [magnetichearts](https://archiveofourown.org/users/magnetichearts/gifts).
  * Inspired by [you can hear it in the silence](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18575722) by [elsaclack](https://archiveofourown.org/users/elsaclack/pseuds/elsaclack). 



> Hey guys!
> 
> I've been hard at work at this fic for the past week and I am happy to be finally posting the final product. I'm a sucker for a good soulmate AU, so I just ran with this and had a ton of fun.
> 
> There are some mentions of Devi and Paxton, but it's really a plot device and it's Devi's obsession/idolization with him rather than any substance. 
> 
> Also, **happy surprise Bhargavi!!** I'm gifting this fic to you because you helped me through it so, so much, from encouraging me to write it in the first place (and literally listening to me come up with plot points while I outlined), to literally always being there to provide me with tiny little details whenever I messaged you to ask a question. I know you've been super excited about this, so I figured you deserved to have it gifted to you!
> 
> Come chat with me on tumblr where I'm @montygreen! I love talking with new people about how much I adore these two idiots!
> 
> Title comes from the MARINA song "Immortal"

Devi wakes up on the first September 23rd feeling like everything has changed.

Objectively, she knows it _hasn’t_. She’s still fighting with Eleanor and Fabiola—the conflict between them only having escalated yesterday night at Ben’s party—her mom snapped at her when she came home wearing sweats and with wet hair, and she doesn’t even want to think about how much more complicated things have just gotten between her and Ben.

Except, none of those things matter, not one bit, the only thing that matters is this: last night Paxton Hall-Yoshida kissed her.

She finally got what she wanted, and now every other piece of her life should fall into place.

She brushes through the tangled mess that is her hair, tosses on her cutest sweater, and practically sprints out the door, giddy with anticipation about seeing Paxton again. She has a history first period, which means she’ll be able to see him and talk about the future of their relationship and that kiss excitingly soon.

Devi takes her seat in class unable to stop grinning ear to ear and nearly shaking with excitement. She plays a few games on her phone while she waits for Paxton to show up. 

Unfortunately, Paxton’s apathy towards school means he steps into class only seconds before the bell, and before Devi can even greet him, Mr. Shapiro starts his lesson. Any conversation is going to have to wait.

Mr. Shapiro claps his hands together. “My young brilliant minds,” he says, smiling too widely for Devi’s comfort. “Telescopes, vaccines, telephones, lightbulbs. The development of science and technology has forever been tied to historical events.” He begins to pace around the room. “Today, I’m assigning a project where, in partners, you will recreate a model of a historically significant scientific invention using the items from your own household.”

While usually, an assignment like this from Mr. Shapiro would make her annoyed, today Devi is surprisingly eager. _Partners!_ She thinks in excitement while the rest of the class groans. _Maybe she’ll get to work with Paxton!_

Mr. Shapiro continues to pace around the room before making his way back to the blackboard. “I’ve already gone ahead and assigned pairs,” he says, as he begins to write out people’s names on the board. Devi sighs in relief when he writes Eleanor and Fabiola next to one another. She isn’t on speaking terms with either of them, and things had only blown up more the night before.

She watches as Mr. Shapiro writes her name out on the board, heart in her throat as she waits for him to write out her partner's name. She hopes, she hopes. _Paxton, Paxton, Paxton._

Devi’s stomach drops when she sees who she’s actually working with, who's name is written next on the board next to her own. 

_Ben._

For a split second, she locks eyes with him.

_Well, fuck._

“I can’t work with him!” Devi blurts out.

Everyone swivels around to face her, and Devi tries to ignore the hurt that flashes through Ben’s eyes. She doesn’t care if he’s hurt, she can’t work with him, she just can’t. She has to work with _Paxton_.

The hurt expression on Ben’s face morphs into smugness. He drums his fingers on his desk. “She’s right, Mr. Shapiro. We can’t work together, because Devi will be finally forced to admit that I’m her academic superior.”

“No,” Devi bites out. “It’s because if we work together, Ben will realize how superior I am to him and start crying _again_.”

Ben glares at her, dark and angry. “That was one time! And you know that’s not what I was upset about.”

Devi smirks. “It’s not what you said you were upset about, but I could see right through you.”

“Enough!” Mr. Shapiro barks out.

Devi turns to Mr. Shapiro, shutting her mouth. _Ugh, stupid Ben for provoking her._ Mr. Shapiro looks at them both, disappointment marring his face. “I will speak to you both about this after class,” he says, before returning to writing out the remaining partners on the blackboard.

True to his word, Mr. Shapiro holds both her and Ben back once the bell rings. He crouches down between their desks. “Look,” he says, “you two are without a doubt my best students, but instead of working together and leaving everyone else in the dust, you waste all your time competing and fighting.” He rubs his forehead. “You two seem a lot more civil than you did at the beginning of the school year. I figured pairing you two together would be a good way for you to set aside your difference, work as a team instead of against one another.” He clasps his hands together. “Do you two think you can do that? I think it would teach your classmates an amazing lesson on forming an alliance for the sake of a common goal.”

Ben answers first. “Of course, Mr. Shapiro.” He looks over at Devi smirking. “I’m sure we can make it work right, David?”

Devi crosses her arms and scowls at Ben. 

“Devi?” Mr. Shapiro prompts, tearing her out of her thoughts. “Do you think you can work with Ben?”

She’s tempted to yell out she can’t, she can’t, _she can’t._ But Mr. Shapiro is right, things are better with Ben than they were at the beginning of the school year. Before last night she was even starting to consider him a friend.

(But now, she’s not sure he is a friend. She keeps thinking about the way his eyes lit up and the way he smiled in his theatre room last night. She keeps thinking about the weird feeling it stirred in her. He looked at her like the best present he'd gotten for his birthday was _her_ , sitting there with him. What if she hadn’t pushed him aw—?)

She swallows that thought down and jerkily nods her head. “Yeah, of course,” she answers, sounding convincingly sweet.

Mr. Shapiro claps his hands together and stands back up. “Excellent, projects are due in a week. I have big expectations for you two.” He grins widely at them and waves a hand. “You’re dismissed.”

The rest of the school day is uneventful, but Devi never finds the time to talk to Paxton, and it’s disappointing, to say the least.

She greets Ben at his locker after school, fingers tucked under her backpack straps. “Hey, Gross, you ready to get this project over with?”

Ben turns to her, looking slightly annoyed, his brow furrowed. “What are you doing here?”

“Look, the sooner we get started on this project, the sooner it’ll be over with,” Devi reasons. “So, I figure we should get started now.”

Ben frowns at her, but nods his head. “Right,” he agrees, looking a little sad. “Over.”

Devi fiddles with the hem on her sweater as she waits for Ben to grab his books from his locker, periodically checking her phone for a text from Paxton. He kissed her yesterday, and Devi isn’t sure why he still hasn’t texted her. Annoyed, and still waiting for Ben, she takes on the responsibility herself, and sends him a text.

 **Devi:** Do you want to hang out soon?

She stuffs her phone in her pocket when she hears Ben shut his locker, and together they exit Sherman Oaks High. There’s an awkward silence between them as they walk, and though Devi is a chatty person, by nature, she isn't quite sure how to break it.

She finally does when she steps into his house. “Damn, Gross, your house is cold.”

Ben gives her a weird look that she can’t quite decipher. “Do you want me to lend you a hoodie or something?” he asks, frowning slightly at her.

Devi shakes her head. “No. I’m okay.”

Ben’s grimace is more prominent now, crease lines forming on his forehead, but Devi ignores it and takes a seat at his kitchen island, pulling her textbook out of her bag.

Ben sits down next to her, pulls his textbook out of his bag, and they begin to work in silence.

They decide to rebuild Louis Le Prince’s stop motion camera, something they can easily put together using the items Ben has scattered around his house.

Half an hour into taking notes on the subject, Ben pokes her in the arm to get her attention. “Hey.”

Devi looks up at him to find his eyes filled with concern. Apprehension. “You’ve been weird today, are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” Devi grits out, nodding her head. 

“You sure? You had a pretty big fight with your friends last night.”

“I was there, Ben!” Devi yells. She immediately feels bad, she didn’t mean to yell at him, not really. Just because Paxton hasn’t fucking texted her back, and Eleanor and Fabiola aren’t speaking to her, she doesn’t need to take that out on Ben. She pinches the bridge of her nose. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to yell.”

“Yeah,” Ben sighs, “I know.”

“Really," she reassures him. "I’m okay.”

“You sure? You’ve been kinda jerking me around today,” he says, suddenly looking more anxious. “Is this because of yesterday night?” He asks, twisting his hands together in his lap. “Look, Devi, I’m really sorry, I shouldn’t have tried to—you know—um—”

Devi raises a hand to cut him off. “You said you were drunk.”

“Not really,” Ben says quietly, looking more nervous than before.

Devi feels alarmed at his admission, but she's careful not to let it show. “Look," she says, hand still raised. "I don’t really want to talk about this, what I do want to talk about is how we can wow Mr. Shapiro.”

Ben’s eyes glint. “You sure you want to wow him, David? He might make us work together more often in the future.”

Devi opens her mouth to respond to him when her phone buzzes with a text. She promptly shuts her mouth and glances at her phone to see that Paxton has finally texted her back.

Her hands shake, and she has to type in her passcode a few times due to how sweaty her fingers are. She finally opens up her text thread and sees his message.

 **Paxton:** I’m free now.

Devi grins at her phone, gathers her things, and tosses them into her bag.

Ben looks up at her, blinking rapidly. “Where are you going?”

“Uh—” Devi tries to think of an excuse as she throws her backpack over her shoulder, but then settles for honesty, she doesn’t need to justify herself to _Ben_. “Paxton needs me!” she says by way of an explanation.

Ben’s expression only turns more confused. “Wait, you’re leaving?”

As she makes her way toward the door, Devi glances over her shoulder. “I’m sorry, Ben. We can work on the project tomorrow, okay?”

“Yeah,” Ben agrees. “Tomorrow.”

Devi tosses him one last apologetic smile and runs out the door. And well, if Ben’s face falls as she goes, she doesn’t even notice.

* * *

Devi wakes up on the second September 23rd annoyed.

Just thinking back to the day before makes her cringe. Yesterday with Paxton was a complete and utter failure. She laid it on too thick and tried too hard, and he kept shooting her confused glances. 

But, she reminds herself, it doesn’t matter if yesterday failed, because she has today. 

She throws on a matching outfit to her favourite sweater jean combo from yesterday, albeit in a different colour scheme, and fixes up her hair. She’s a bit confused when she spots the clothes she wore yesterday still hanging up in her closet, but she figures after failing to make any progress with Paxton yesterday, her brain was all kinds of mixed up. Putting her clothes in the wrong place makes perfect sense after a failure like that.

She makes her way to school and sits down at her desk in history class bright and early, waiting for Paxton to arrive so she can apologize for making a fool of herself and schedule something with him after school today.

Unfortunately, much like the day before, Paxton walks in seconds before the bell rings, and Mr. Shapiro starts his lesson.

She zones out a little as he talks, chin propped up on her hands as she stares at the back of Paxton’s head. She only blinks back into focus when she hears Mr. Shapiro mumble her name as he writes it out on the blackboard. Beside it, he writes down Ben’s name. 

_Wait what?_

Devi blinks several times as she stares at the names written on the board. They’re the same pairs Mr. Shapiro wrote down yesterday.

_What the fuck is happening?_

She can't ask Paxton because she knows he doesn't pay attention in this class, and she can’t ask Eleanor and Fabiola since they’re still not speaking to her.

So, she really has only one option. 

And she grabs that option by the elbow once class is dismissed and they're out in the hall. 

Ben whips around, blue eyes meeting hers. “David, w—what?” he stutters.

Devi places a hand on her hip. “We got assigned that project yesterday, right? Why was Mr. Shapiro assigning it again?”

“W—what?”

“Yeah,” Devi says, rapidly losing her confidence. “I was working on it at your place yesterday after school.” 

Ben blinks at her rapidly, clearly confused and then he laughs. “No, last night was my party.” His expression morphs into concern. “Did you—uh—smack your head when you fell into my pool last night or drink too much of Trent’s ball punch?”

“L—last night ?” Devi stammers. “But your birthday is on September 22nd. Isn’t today the 24th?”

Ben’s concern only grows. “You should get your head checked out, David. Today is definitely the 23rd.”

But yesterday was the 23rd, she’s certain of it.

Suddenly Devi feels a little dizzy, a little lightheaded, a little faint. Like she’s been sucked into a spinning vortex or a whirlpool.

She slowly begins to put the pieces together. If yesterday was the 23rd, and today is also the 23rd, then that means she’s reliving it. 

(She feels butterflies brush their wings against her stomach.)

She’s reliving September 23rd. 

Which can mean only one thing. 

She’s developed _real_ feelings for her soulmate.

(The kaleidoscope of butterflies take flight, filling every inch of her body with giddy, nervous energy.)

And, it’s obvious who her soulmate is. Painfully, beautifully obvious. Paxton.

He had kissed her on September 22nd after Ben’s party. Finally kissing him must be what turned her idolization and obsession with him into real feelings. It has to be Paxton, it has to be him. And if she remembers what she learned about the soulmate system, then she knows the time loop only breaks after she and her soulmate kiss. So, Devi makes it her whole sole purpose to kiss Paxton Hall-Yoshida again.

She’s only torn out of her thoughts by Ben’s insistent tapping on her arm. “David, are you good?”

Devi snaps her head back up to look at him. “I’m good.”

Ben narrows his eyes, regarding her with suspicion. “So do we want to get started on this project after school or—?

“After school is good,” Devi answers, fully knowing she’ll only be at his house until she can find an excuse to go over to Paxton’s.

It doesn’t matter if she abandons Ben, she rationalizes, he’s not reliving the day, so he won’t remember. Not to mention, once she breaks the time loop, she’ll still have six whole days to finish their project. They’re the best two students in the class, so once she kisses Paxton Hall-Yoshida, breaks out of the time loop, and can devote her mind completely to Mr. Shapiro’s assignment, they’ll probably have it finished in an hour.

Ben flashes a smile at her, it’s small, but strangely genuine, and whatever flip it makes her stomach do, well, that’s irrelevant.

When the end of the day rolls around, she finds herself in the same place as yesterday, fingers tucked under her backpack straps as she waits for Ben at his locker, sending a text to Paxton. 

They make their way out of Sherman Oaks High, a heavy silence settling itself between them and lasting until they’re back at Ben’s house. “Pretty cold here, Gross,” Devi says as she steps into his foyer, wrapping her arms around herself to preserve warmth.

Ben doesn’t say anything, he simply tilts his head and purses his lips.

_Yesterday he offered her a hoodie._

They settle into silence as they work at his kitchen island, Ben only breaking it half an hour in. “Uh.” Devi glances up at the sound of his voice. He rubs the back of his neck bashfully, and she thinks he might be blushing. “I—I’m really sorry if I made things weird... between us.”

“It’s okay,” Devi says, with a shake of her head. “You didn’t.”

Ben sighs and runs a hand through his hair. “I did,” he insists. “I really shouldn’t have tried to—uh—you know—the night of my—”

Devi knows where he’s going with this, and she doesn’t like it, so she quickly cuts him off. “I kissed Paxton!”

Ben tilts his head, frowning slightly. “Oh?”

 _That_ certainly wasn’t the reaction she wanted or expected. The only acceptable reaction is tons of congratulations and someone shaking her shoulders and grinning ear to ear. Not that she expected Ben Gross to do something like that. She just expected something more comparable to the reactions she’s not getting—but desperately wants—from Fabiola and Eleanor, who still aren't talking to her.

“Yeah,” Devi says. “When he drove me home from your party. He just leaned over, and he kissed me.” She feels her face heat up. “It was my first, actually.”

Ben jerkily nods his head. “Well, congratulations?” He sounds a little confused as if he’s not sure whether he’s giving her the right response.

He’s not, but it’s better than no response, and Devi feels a bit happier sharing her good news with someone. She bumps her shoulder against his and smiles. “Thanks, Ben.”

She glances at her phone, seeing an expected text. “Speaking of Paxton, I gotta run.” She tosses her bag over her shoulder. “We can work on the project tomorrow?” If she gets this encounter with Paxton right, she can be true to her word, and there will be a tomorrow for them to work on their project.

“Sure,” Ben agrees. “Tomorrow works for me.” She ignores the undercurrent of sadness in his voice. 

Devi flashes him a big smile and giddily skips out the door. 

She will make it to tomorrow, she’s certain of it.

* * *

Devi wakes up on the third September 23rd feeling fiercely determined.

Things hadn’t exactly worked out the evening before when she was hanging out with Paxton in his garage, though she’d gotten close. There was a moment when she was babbling about something—she doesn’t really remember what—and she caught Paxton staring at her with fierce intensity, and she was certain he was going to kiss her. She’d even stupidly let her eyes flutter shut in anticipation. 

And then Rebecca had walked in. 

Devi couldn’t even be mad or annoyed, Rebecca was so excited to see her, thanked her so many times for helping with her photoshoot, and even asked Devi if she wanted to play video games. She couldn’t turn that offer down, so she’d ended up sitting between Rebecca and Paxton, being dominated by both of them in Super Smash Bros.

It doesn’t matter, today is the same yesterday, so she can just kiss Paxton today.

She jumps out of bed and puts on the same pair of clothes that she wore on the first occurrence of September 23rd. She remembers reading a study that said one is more likely to succeed with their soulmate if they start every morning the same way, and goddamnit, today is definitely going to be a success.

She shows up to history class, but doesn’t arrive early. She knows Paxton isn’t going to show up until a few seconds before the bell, so trying to talk to him before class begins and Mr. Shapiro assigns their project is futile.

She steps into the class only minutes before the bell and spots Ben at his desk, locking eyes with him for a split moment.

(She is suddenly transported back the way he smiled at her the night of his party. The way his eyes gleamed as he grinned when she handed him a box of California Brittle. How his features were both sharpened and smoothed out all at once. The way she caught him looking at her, with something dangerously hopeful, but also gentle, shining in his eyes.)

Devi abruptly looks away from him and turns her eyes toward the ground, shuffling awkwardly to her seat.

The rest of the day repeats as usual; Mr. Shapiro assigns his “outside the box” (read: stupid) project, she greets Ben at his locker after school, they walk over to his house together silently, and Devi makes a quip about the temperature when she steps into his foyer.

Half an hour into working and their project (with no text from Paxton), Devi groans and slams her history textbook shut, resting her head atop it. “Finally ready to give up and let me take over, David?” Ben asks, and she can hear the stupid smirk in his voice.

“This project is so dumb,” Devi moans, not even bothering to lift her head.

She hears Ben shut his textbook too. “You’re not wrong, Shapiro doesn’t seem interested in teaching us anything on future AP tests.”

Devi raises her head so she can face Ben more fully. “What’s the point in taking an AP history course if we don’t get adequate preparation for exams?”

Ben laughs. “Agreed.”

Devi cocks her head. “I mean, I guess we should give him some credit. He’s integrating science with history, and we both know science is my best subject.”

“Hmm,” Ben hums, drumming his fingers on his textbook, and she wonders what those fingers would feel like linked with hers.

(Wait, what?)

“You’re decently good at science, yes.”

Devi arches an eyebrow and glares at him. “Decently good?”

“Yeah,” Ben confirms. “You’re decently good, and I’m the best.”

“You are not,” Devi protests.

“Am too.”

Devi wacks him in the shoulder. “The quiz we got back last week on organic nomenclature says something different, Gross.”

“David, you beat me by half a mark because I used the in-fixing instead of the pre-fixing method for one molecule, which might I add is still a very valid system.”

Devi crosses her arms over her chest and smirks. “I still beat you.”

“Oh, yeah?” Ben challenges. “What about that biology quiz on mitosis?”

Devi feels herself blush. “What about it?”

“You forgot an entire stage, David, you forgot prometaphase!”

Devi gapes at him. “I did not!”

“David, you waved your test paper in front of me when you got it back.” He taps his temple. “Believe me, I remember exactly where you lost points.”

Devi wacks him again in the shoulder, but still finds herself laughing.

It’s nice laughing _with_ Ben instead of _at_ him. It reminds her of that moment in her kitchen; the first night she began to see Ben as who he really is. She likes this Ben, the real one, the one who laughs with her, flashes her easy smiles, and still teases her, but playfully.

Laughing with Ben is like cracking open a geode to find amethyst inside. It takes a bit of effort, but when finally split open, it's the most beautiful thing in the world. Ben's laugh is like that, hard-earned, but worth it, beautiful in its vibrancy.

The vibrancy fades, and the moment shatters when Devi feels her phone vibrate in her pocket. She doesn’t even check her phone, she already knows who the message is from and what it’s going to say. 

She jumps off her stool and slides her textbook into her bag. “I gotta go help Paxton with something. We can keep working tomorrow,” she says, flashing Ben a smile. “But you got your wish. You get to take over the project for today.”

Usually, Devi would never give such control to Ben, but she can deal with that issue once she gets Paxton to kiss her and frees herself from this time loop. Right now, she has bigger priorities than their history project. Her future love life is on the line!

She bumps her shoulder with Ben’s on the way out and offers him another smile, finding it harder than the day before to ignore the saddened expression that crosses his face.

As she walks over to Paxton’s house, she tries to come up with a plan for how to get him to kiss her, but try as she might, her mind always drifts away. She just can’t stop thinking about Ben’s laugh, the dimples that formed on his cheeks, the way his eyes crinkled. She can stop thinking about _him_.

* * *

The next twenty-one September 23rds are relatively the same. Devi repeats the same actions over and over again, only altering her strategy to woo Paxton.

Her conversations with Ben change daily too, but she pays them no mind because things with Ben are always juxtaposed. He’s ever-changing, but always present, like the shifting tides in the ocean. For as many new things as she and Ben find to talk about, he’s still the same Ben: a little arrogant, very funny, with teasing snark and dry sense of wit, and constant.

* * *

On the twenty-fifth September 23rd, Devi can hardly drag herself out of bed.

Her continual failure is starting to weigh on her, and repeating the same motions day after day to end up nowhere is _exhausting._ She doesn’t even want to think about her most recent string of Paxton related blunders. 

(Yesterday, she cut her knee when she walked into a box in his garage, so it was clear repeating the day wasn’t doing anything to make her more smooth.) 

Devi glumly drags herself out of bed and makes her way to school, only slinking into history class right before the bell. She catches a confused glance from Ben as she makes her way to her seat, something in his blue eyes akin to worry. She understands why he might be confused, she’s never shown up to a class this late a day in her life. 

(Though to be fair, she’s also never lived through the same day twenty-five times, so she’s experiencing a lot of firsts today.)

When Mr. Shapiro finally starts class and begins explaining their project, Devi lets her mind wander. She doesn’t need to pay any attention to what he’s saying, she’s heard him give the same spiel countless times. Usually, she spends history class staring at the back of Paxton’s head, an almost blissful expression on her face, as she fantasizes about their life together once she finally breaks this time loop. 

Today, however, she doesn’t think about Paxton, she doesn’t further plan how to win him over, instead, she repeatedly glances towards the back of the class at Eleanor and Fabiola. They’re both engaged in Mr. Shapiro’s lesson, scribbling down notes into their respective notebooks. Eleanor is dressed even more drab and depressingly than the night of Ben’s party. She’s wearing the same thing she’s worn for the past twenty-five repeats, tan on tan. 

She feels her heart twinge when Eleanor looks up at her for a brief second and immediately turns back to her notes.

She wants so desperately to apologize, to make things right with her two best friends. She didn’t notice it before, so focused on her single-minded goal, but every repeat she’s lived, she’s only become more isolated. She’s lonely, crippling lonely, and she misses her best friends more than anything in the world.

If Devi is a powerful fire, impulsively burning, temperamentally blazing, passionately scorching, then Fabiola is the earth. She is grounding, stable, steady, reliable, and keeps Devi’s flames from burning too fast and too fiercely. 

Eleanor too balances Devi out, for she is the air. Her witty, carefree, joyful personality is the perfect complement to Devi’s fiery confidence, smothering her flames before they burn too bright, but also shining all on her own.

Without them, Devi is an uncontrollable wildfire, bringing about only destruction and chaos to those she cares most about.

(Ben, she realizes as she glances over at him, is the water. Compassionate, intelligent, quick-witted, easily able to match her intensity, and the only person who can exterminate Devi’s fiery temperament. Together, they are the four elements and should be balanced in perfect harmony. It hurts her more and more every single repeat that they are not.)

She knows she could fix her friendships, she could apologize to Eleanor and Fabiola and soothe her lonely ache, but it strikes her again and again that there is no point. As long as she keeps reliving this day, they won’t remember anything she says. The minute she wakes up she’ll be brought back to square one, back her friends being so mad they won’t as much as spare a glance in her direction.

Her sombre mood continues for the rest of the afternoon, showing no signs of relenting even when she finds herself seated at Ben’s kitchen island starting out their history project for the twenty-fifth time. She hasn’t spoken to him aside from her daily quip about the temperature of his house and while they were selecting their project topic.

Half an hour into taking notes, Ben pokes her in the arm to get her attention. “Hey, David.” 

Devi snaps her head up to look at him, but doesn’t say anything.

“Can I ask you something?” he finally says.

Devi shrugs her shoulders. “Shoot.”

“Why didn’t you fight Shapiro so you could do this project with Eleanor and Fabiola?”

She doesn’t know why his completely innocent question rubs her the wrong way, but it does, and she finds herself immediately going into defence mode, hardening her armor. 

Devi shuts her textbook and frowns at him. “What?”

“I said why didn’t you—”

Devi cuts him off. “I heard what you said, Gross.” She crosses her arms over her chest defensively. “Why do you even care? It’s not like you’re experienced with friendship.”

She watches hurt flash across Ben's face and feels impossibly guilty. Oh no, she doesn’t want to burn her bridges with him too. He’s all she has left. Devi sighs and shuts her eyes as she rubs her forehead. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean that,” she breathes. 

“Yeah, I know you didn’t.”

“I—we’re just not on speaking terms right now,” she says, finally opening her eyes again to look at him.

Ben smirks. “Your friends finally got tired of you?" 

Devi kicks the ground with her foot and scoffs. “You’re such a dick. I don’t know why I bothered to tell you.”

Ben raises his hands. “Okay, sorry, I’ll listen.” He tilts his head. “What’s wrong?”

In Ben’s eyes is none of the pity of sympathy she expects—his expression is nothing like the looks she’s gotten from Kamala or her mother when she said that she wasn’t going to spend time with Eleanor and Fabiola for a while—but genuine understanding.

Devi studies Ben for a moment. Studies him the same way she does a new novel, recognizing that the words have always been there, but that they are new to her. She realizes the understanding he has for her is like that, it has always been present, she just never bothered to notice.

It doesn’t matter if she tells him everything, when the day resets, he won’t remember a word of their conversation. Devi needs to vent, needs to let her emotions out, needs someone to listen. Maybe Ben can be (and has always been) that person.

She makes her way over to the couch, drawing her knees up to her chest when she sits. Ben takes the spot next to her and looks at her patiently. 

“I really fucked up,” she admits, letting out a weary, exhausted sigh. “I was a terrible friend, and I abandoned them both when they needed me most, and now they’re mad, and I miss them so, so much and I don’t know what to do.” She feels tears shining in her eyes, but blinks them back. Ben may not remember this conversation tomorrow, but she will. She’ll forever be haunted if she breaks down in front of him.

“I think you know what you have to do,” Ben says quietly.

“I don’t,” Devi says, shaking her head, continuing to blink back tears. “I really don't.”

“You do,” Ben says, sounding more confident. “Devi, I know you do.” 

Devi blinks at him, her voice coming out quiet and small. “How do you know that?” 

"Because you're Devi. You've got a horrible temper—" 

"Hey!" she cuts in, but he keeps speaking. 

"—And you don't always know when to stop fixating on something, but you care about your friends. You're human, and you fucked up. You might not be as smart as me, but you still know that you have to make things right. That's just the kind of person you are." 

"The kind of person I am?" She hates how unsure she sounds, an ocean between the confidence swimming in Ben's voice. 

"Yeah," he laughs, nodding. "Someone brave and strong and who always does the right thing, even if it's a little late."

“What if I can’t?” Devi asks. “What if I’ve broken my friendship with Eleanor and Fabiola for good?”

Ben huffs another laugh and shakes his head. “Not possible, there is nothing you can't find a way to fix.” He offers her a soft, reassuring smile. “The most important thing is that you try.”

Devi doesn’t know why she does it—it’s impulsive, stupid, and a little reckless, but that’s nothing new for her—but she scoots forward and wraps her arms around Ben, hugging him tightly. He stiffens a bit against her at first, before his arms wind around her, hugging her back. She breathes him in for a few moments, comforted by the scent of sandalwood and something uniquely him, and moves to tuck her head under his chin.

It’s then that her phone chooses to vibrate and Devi quickly extricates herself from Ben’s arms, smiling shyly at him. She murmurs her usual excuse about having to go help Paxton with something and makes her way out the door.

As she makes her way to Paxton’s house, her mind begins to spin as she questions her decision. Why does she keep choosing Paxton over everyone else? Shouldn’t her soulmate not be forcing this decision upon her, but it be one she makes willingly? 

(Why does she feel that the only moments she does things truly willingly are moments with Ben? Why did she think it was a good idea to hug him, and why did she feel so comforted as he held her?)

But she promptly shoves those thoughts down when Paxton’s garage enters her line of sight and fills herself with a new resolve to get out of this day.

* * *

The next twenty-two September 23rds can only be described as uneventful.

Devi follows the same schedule: she goes to school, spends history class thinking up new strategies to get Paxton to kiss her, heads over to Ben’s overly cold house, and ditches him to set her Paxton plans in motion.

Every day she spends with Ben, he seems sadder than the one before, and Devi feels bad, abandoning him so many times over, but she decides that she can’t truly help him until she gets out of this time loop. She vows to talk to Ben, to offer him the same comfort he gave her when she was upset about her friends as soon as she finally makes it to September 24th.

(She locks eyes with him at least once a day and finds his eyes always hold an emotion slightly different than the day before. Understanding, loneliness, sympathy, sorrow. When Devi looks into Ben’s eyes, she both understands and is further mystified by the saying, “the eyes are the window to the soul.” While Ben holds endless emotions in his blue, blue eyes, Devi feels she understands him no better than the day before. She is no closer to seeing what resides in his soul, no closer to truly understanding him the way he understands her. And the fact that he can read her—understand her nuances the same way he does his favourite book—while she still can’t decipher his code is fucking terrifying.)

* * *

On the fiftieth September 23rd, Paxton Hall-Yoshida, finally, finally kisses her. 

At first, the day seems like a completely normal one, and she feels the way she’s felt for the past ten repeats, weary and exhausted. She doesn’t want to keep meticulously planning only for every single idea she has to fail. She’s tired of this! Shouldn’t her soulmate come to her? Why is it her job to set things in motion? Why can’t they fucking do it for a change?

As per usual, she finds herself sitting at Ben’s kitchen island as they start to plan out their history project for the fiftieth time, only she can’t focus.

She slams her textbook shut. “I read a study on soulmates the other day,” she says. 

It’s not a weird thing to bring up, there’s an entire scientific field dedicated to soulmate time loops, and new studies are constantly published. Plus, it’s not like Ben will remember anything she tells him. 

Ben closes his textbook and turns to look up at her. He snorts. “That doesn’t exactly seem like your type of reading, David."

Devi ignores his taunt and continues. “It said that the longest soulmate loop took like, 8 years. How did people not get discouraged? Wouldn’t be ridiculously difficult reliving the same day over and over again? Even the global average of 6 months feels like agonizingly long.”

Ben turns his gaze back to the sheet of paper in front of him. “Well, you know what they say, love always finds a way." 

Devi places a hand on her hip and rolls her eyes “Don’t tell me you actually believe that, Gross.”

Ben looks back up at her, more of those emotions she can’t quite translate swimming in his eyes. “No,” he finally says after a beat of silence. “I think it’s complete and utter bullshit.”

He seems weirdly saddened by the topic, and Devi chooses not to push it further. Instead, she reopens her textbook and returns to taking notes on Louis Le Prince’s stop motion camera.

At the expected time, she feels her phone vibrate from a text and excuses herself out the door, ignoring the guilt twisting in her gut caused by the sad look that crosses Ben’s face.

She jogs over to Paxton’s house, knocks on his door, and as usual, he lets her into his garage. She doesn’t have a plan for today, for the first time, she didn’t bother to make one, she just collapses rather ungracefully on his couch. She pats the spot next to her, inviting Paxton to sit. He sits down next to her, and she loses herself in the silence. _She can’t do this anymore._

When Devi looks up at Paxton, staring into his luminescent kaleidoscopic eyes, she contemplates being direct and blunt. For a brief moment, she contemplates asking him if he’s reliving this day the same way she is. She considers asking him if he thinks he’s her soulmate. 

She opens her mouth to speak, but then promptly shuts it upon realizing what a horrifically bad idea asking any of those questions is.

What an idiotic thought, she can’t ask those questions to _Paxton_. She has to be suave and cool and calculated to make this work. She has to fashion herself into someone ideal for _him_ , and that does not involve blurting out the secret she’s been carrying for fifty days like a babbling idiot. She has to—

Her thoughts are cut off when she feels a hand tilt up her chin, and suddenly, Paxton is kissing her.

(Devi doesn’t know how you’re supposed to feel when your soulmate finally kisses you, but this definitely isn’t it. She expected fireworks and, as cliche as it sounds, the feeling of a new beginning. This is none of that. This is kind of disappointing.)

(Well, of course it’s disappointing, she reminds herself, she’s been waiting for this for fifty days now.)

She only lets it last a second, pulling away so, so quickly and immediately pumping her fist into the air.

It doesn’t matter if it was disappointing, now that she’s finally broken the loop, she’ll have plenty of tomorrows to kiss Paxton and have him kiss her properly.

Paxton looks genuinely nervous. His throat bobs as he swallows. “You good?" 

“Yeah,” Devi says, smiling. “Yeah, I’m good!” 

She awkwardly pats Paxton on the shoulder. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Paxton.”

As she makes her way back to her house, she thinks that for the first time, she’s genuinely confident that tomorrow will come.

* * *

Devi wakes up on the fifty-first September 23rd convinced she’s finally broken the time loop. 

She shows up to history class bright and early, excited about planning out the future of her relationship with Paxton. Unfortunately, his apathy towards school means he walks into class moments before the bell rings, and she has no chance to talk to him.

Devi twirls her pencil in her fingers as she daydreams about her future, about the infinite tomorrows she has with her soulmate. She’s only pulled from her thoughts when she hears something she swears she’s heard before.

“—Today, I’m assigning a project where, in partners, you will recreate a model of a historically significant scientific invention using the items from your own household.”

She glances down at herself and sees she’s dressed the same as yesterday, reliving the same day over and over again has become so habitual, so instinctive, she’s wearing the same clothing.

As she glances around the room, she realizes everyone is also dressed the same.

_Oh fuck._

She rarely pulls her phone out in class, but today she slips it out of her pocket, heart in her throat, fingers unbearably sweaty as she powers it on.

The date above her lock screen—a photo of her with Fabiola and Eleanor making goofy faces—is exactly what she dreads. It’s September 23rd.

It’s _still_ September 23rd.

She’s _still_ reliving September 23rd.

And that can only mean one thing. Paxton isn’t her soulmate.

She can’t fucking believe it! She wasted fifty days trying to get Paxton Hall-Yoshida to kiss her, and even when she finally got what she wanted, nothing changed. She is still trapped in a miserable time loop, but it’s worse than before because now she has no idea how to break the loop. She has no idea who the fuck her soulmate is.

Her vision suddenly turns red, all rational thoughts completely escaping her, and she grabs her history textbook off her desk and hurls it across the room. The entire class, including Mr. Shapiro, turns to her in shock, but Devi doesn’t care. “I need to go to the bathroom,” she bites out. 

She doesn’t even wait for Mr. Shapiro’s response or to be given permission, she simply stands up, pushes her chair out of the way, and stomps out of the room.

She rushes into the bathroom. and once she confirms that she’s the only one there, she screams in front of the mirror. She screams and screams and screams until her throat feels raw, and she can’t scream anymore.

Devi’s anger is like a spontaneous chemical reaction, once the initial energy is inputted (her discovery that’s she _still_ fucking living the same day), it proceeds to completion without relent. Her anger is akin to combustion: explosive, catastrophic, unstoppable, irreversible.

She splashes water on her face and after—she doesn’t know how long, in all honesty—a while, she finally steps out of the bathroom. 

She spots Ben seconds later, hands tucked into his back pockets, staring at the ground. _Was he waiting for her?_ The idea that he might makes her irrationally even angrier. “What the hell are you doing here, Gross?” she seethes.

He looks up to her, blue eyes flashing with concern. “Mr. Shapiro dismissed class a few minutes ago, and I have a free period, so I wanted to make sure you were okay.”

“Well, I’m obviously _not_ okay! You couldn’t possibly know what I’m going through!” Devi yells, ignoring the twinge of guilt she feels taking her anger out on Ben again. 

The hurt in his expression fades quickly, shifting back into worry. He raises a hand. “We don’t have to talk about it,” he reassures her. “But after you stormed out, Mr. Shapiro assigned a project, and he paired us up, so we should probably make plans to meet up after school.”

She’s tempted to yell out, _I know, I know, he’s assigned me the same project fifty-one fucking times._ She’s so tempted to spill her floodgates to him, tell him all about this stupid time loop and how she no longer even knows how to fix it. But she keeps her mouth shut and simply nods her head, anger finally having boiled over. “Yeah,” she agrees. “Okay.” 

So that’s how, as expected, she ends up sitting at Ben’s kitchen island, planning out their project. She manages to take notes continuously today, despite knowing her efforts will all be futile when the day resets.

Ben’s voice pulls her out of her note-taking trance. “If you have better things to do,” he says, pointing towards his door. “You can leave.”

Devi snorts and rolls her eyes. “Trying to get rid of me that easily, Gross?”

Instead of acknowledging to her joke the way she expects, Ben simply pinches his brow and lets out a defeated sigh. “Look,” he says. “I know you didn’t want to work on this project with me, hell, when Mr. Shapiro assigned it, you threw your textbook across the room. I’m just trying to give you an easy out.”

Devi knows this is the exact time she usually ditches Ben for Paxton, but that can’t be something he’s aware of, he’s not relived this same day fifty-one times now. And she has no reason to ditch Ben today, with the realization that Paxton isn’t her soulmate, spending her time and energy wooing him seems exhausting. Just the idea of going over to his house again makes her feel a little queasy. She can’t believe she spent so much time being so, so stupid.

Devi twirls her pen between her fingers. “No,” she says. “I’d rather stay here.”

Ben glances at her skeptically. “Alright,” he finally says, not seeming convinced at all. Devi tries to ignore the way she feels her heart squeeze in her chest, she wonders, wonders, how she broke his trust so badly.

(She hates that somehow, something she’s done has truly hurt Ben. Usually, their arguing and bickering is venomous and has bite, but they know what lines not to cross. Devi has a feeling that somehow she’s gone and crossed all the lines. If the night of his party left their dynamic dangling on a precipice, she’s gone and sent it careening off a cliff.)

An awkward silence passes between them as Devi returns to her note-taking, but she can’t focus, not with Ben acting so weirdly. So as usual, she’s direct about it. She tosses her pen down in frustration, and Ben’s eyes flick up to lock with hers. “Why are you being so weird?”

Ben lets out a mocking laugh. “I’m sorry?” he says, crossing his arms over his chest and scowling. “I’m the one being weird?”

“Yeah, you’re like, not talking to me whatsoever.”

“And that’s unusual?”

“Yes,” Devi grits out. “It is.” 

Ben rubs his forehead. “Devi, you have been mean to me—unprompted—all day. I can tell you’re mad about something, but that doesn’t give you an excuse to take your anger out on other people.”

_Oh god._

Ben’s right. She’s been beyond mean to him and not in the competitive way she can justify. She’s been aggressive and hostile for no reason at all. She hasn’t been fair to him.

She swallows the planetary sized lump beginning to form in her throat. “I know,” she says, breaking the awkward silence that’s settled itself between them. “I know, and I’m really, really sorry. You didn’t deserve any of that.” She lets out a shaky deep breath. “I was just frustrated with something else, and you're right, I did take it out on you. It's something I've been trying to fix—clearly, I'm still a work in progress—and I'm really sorry that you were on the wrong side of it.” She swallows roughly again. “I’m sorry, I was wrong to yell at you, especially when you were just worried.”

“It’s okay,” Ben says, and for the first time in a long time, he cracks a smile. “Thanks." 

Ben’s smile makes her feel a little better, she thinks as she smiles back.

(Ben’s smile always makes everything better.)

* * *

Devi feels _better_ when she wakes up on the fifty-second September 23rd. She knows it’s still the 23rd, but somehow, that doesn’t distress her as much as it did the day before. She feels weirdly more at peace with the time loop, with the idea of working it out on her own

She realizes that apologizing to Ben yesterday for being such a dick is the reason for her improved mood. He might not remember, but alleviating his pain for even a single moment made her apology worth it.

(Seeing him smile again made her apology worth it too.)

She owes the exact same thing to Eleanor and Fabiola.

It’s no longer about them remembering her apology, but the act of apologizing. The act of trying to do better, Devi comes to realize, is more important than the action itself.

She makes her way to history class and takes a seat at her desk, ready to listen to Mr. Shapiro assign the same project yet again. As he talks and writes out partners on the board, Devi doodles on the sheet of paper in front of her and mouths along to his lesson plan. She has his entire spiel memorized, so she can’t be blamed for having a little fun.

At lunch, she spots Eleanor and Fabiola seated at their normal table in the courtyard. She takes a few deep breaths in and out before she makes her way over to them.

Devi sits down next to Eleanor, and—there’s really no more elegant way to put how she approaches this—just starts rambling.

“El, Fab,” she starts, causing them both to look up at her. “I really fucked up, and I am so, so sorry. I’ve been a horrible friend lately, and I abandoned you both when you needed me most. I was wrong obsessing over Paxton, and I can’t believe I picked him over you guys. You are two of the bravest, fiercest people I know, and you deserve so much better than a friend like me.” She takes another sharp deep breath. “I understand if you can never forgive me, but...” She swallows the lump forming in her throat. “I just needed to say something." 

She watches both Eleanor and Fabiola’s mouths drop open as they try to process what she just said, dread pooling in her gut as she awaits their response.

Devi nervously fiddles with her hands in her lap. “El, Fab, please say something.”

After a few more breaths of uneasy silence, Fabiola eventually nods her head. “Thank you, Devi.”

Devi clasps her hands together on the table. She inhales shakily. “Do you think you can forgive me?”

Fabiola reaches out a hand and rests it on Devi’s arm. “Yeah, I think we can,” she says as Eleanor nods her head in agreement. 

Devi smiles at both Eleanor and Fabiola and feels a bit lighter, like a piece of her soul has righted itself once more, when they smile back. 

They spend a few moments catching up. Devi and Fabiola encourage Eleanor to rejoin the play and re-embrace her floral colourful fashion sense, and Fabiola gushes to Devi and Eleanor about Eve. 

Fabiola suddenly checks her phone. “I gotta go,” she says, cheeks pinkened with blush. “Eve and I are going for lunch, actually.”

“Have fun,” Eleanor coos, grinning widely.

Fabiola flashes them both another smile and gathers her stuff before she waves goodbye and walks away from their table.

Devi tilts her head as she glances at Eleanor. “Fab and Eve aren’t soulmates,” she says as she pulls her thermos from her bag. “Do you think it’s worth their time?”

Eleanor smirks. “Of course it’s worth their time. You’re the only one of us stuck in a time loop after all.”

Devi’s mouth drops agape. “W—what?” she stammers.

“It’s a little obvious,” Eleanor says, sipping her drink. “You’re like, the opposite of subtle." 

Devi’s heart starts pounding in her chest, and her palms grow clammy. _How the fuck did Eleanor figure it out?_

As if she read her mind, Eleanor immediately responds. “Please, Devi. You didn’t show up early for history class like you usually do, and when I looked at you during Mr. Shapiro’s lesson, you were doodling instead of taking notes and mouthing along to the words he said. It’s like you already knew there was no point in showing up early, as if you already knew exactly what project Mr. Shapiro was going to assign. It’s as if you’ve already lived this day before, countless times, hence my conclusion: you’re stuck in a time loop.” 

“Fuck,” Devi curses, burying her head in her hands. “I’ve been that obvious about it, huh?”

‘Extremely,” Eleanor says with a look that’s way too smug for Devi’s comfort. “So tell me,” she says, tapping her index finger on the table. “How many days has it been?”

“Fifty-two,” Devi mumbles, head still buried in her hands, hoping that Eleanor might not have heard her. 

“Dear god,” Eleanor says, shaking her head and clicking her tongue. “You’re hopeless.”

“I’m not hopeless,” Devi protests. “The international average length of a soulmate time loop is six months, and it’s been just over a month and a half!”

Eleanor ignores her defence and instead claps her hands together. “So, do you have any idea who it might be?" 

Devi finally looks up at Eleanor, placing her clasped hands back on the table. She can’t tell Eleanor that she wasted fifty days thinking her soulmate was Paxton, not after apologizing for nearly ruining their friendship _because_ she was so obsessed with him. Devi hates the idea of lying again, but she decides this is a secret worth keeping.

She shakes her head. “No.”

Eleanor laughs. “As I said, hopeless.” She takes another sip of her drink. “I’ve done a lot of reading on soulmate time loops, and a commonality is that your soulmate is often someone who's been a part of your life all along.” She wiggles her eyebrows. “Some might even say someone constant.”

Devi arches an eyebrow. “What exactly are you insinuating?” she asks, crossing her arms.

“I think you know what I’m insinuating, Devi.”

“No, El,” Devi grits out, growing more impatient with her friend by the second. “I don’t.”

Eleanor tosses her head back and forth the way she does when she’s contemplating whether or not to say something.

“I know that gesture, El,” Devi says, as she eats a spoonful of her paneer tikka masala. “Spit it out.”

Eleanor picks the label of her coffee cup. “Have you ever considered that it might be Ben?”

Devi nearly chokes on her food. “W—what?” she splutters.

“Think about it, Devi. You two have been nicer to one another recently, you didn’t even argue with Mr. Shapiro when he paired you together for this project. It’s all embarrassingly clear.”

“You’re being ridiculous!”

“Have you ever seen the way he looks at you?” Eleanor asks, propping her chin upon her hands as she rests her elbows on the table. “More importantly, have you seen the way you look at him?”

“How do I look at him?” Devi asks, feeling a little nauseous as she sets down her thermos.

Eleanor taps her chin contemplatively. “I can’t quite describe it Devi, but for the past week, you’ve always just seemed happier when he’s there, and he’s _always_ looked at you with that classic dopey smitten look on his face.”

Devi snorts. “Ben does not look at me like that.”

(The truth is, Devi knows he does look at her like that. The few times she’s caught Ben glancing at her, he’s had this fond, but fleeting look in his eyes. He looks at her as if she is something precious, but ephemeral, like a rainbow or a bolt of lightning, like he’s drinking her in, studying her, and learning everything about her before she vanishes into nothingness. It’s a yearnful look, one that says something _more_. Ben looks at her like she is some distant star in a sky, something light-years away that he cannot attain, but, oh, he _wants_ , desperately wants. No one else looks at her quite the same way that he does, like she’s more beautiful, more unique, more important than the universe. Like she is the universe all on her own.)

Eleanor’s voice brings her out of her thoughts. “No, he does,” she counters. “He gets this disgustingly soft smile when he looks at you. Plus, he too seemed to know what was happening in history class before it came to pass. When Mr. Shapiro’s phone rang in the middle of the lesson, he didn’t flinch the way everyone else did. He ducked his head mere seconds before Paxton walked into class, so he wouldn’t have to look at him, as if he knew exactly when Paxton would arrive. Then, before Shapiro even assigned project partners his gaze swung over to you.”

“That all seems completely incidental,” Devi argues. “Don’t you think you’re overanalyzing?”

Eleanor shakes her head. “I’ve read enough studies on soulmate time loops to know what I’m seeing.”

“Eleanor,” Devi growls, “Ben Gross is not my soulmate.”

Eleanor frowns. “Hmm,” she hums. “Whatever you say, Devi.”

Devi ignores the way the disappointment marring Eleanor’s expression makes her heart squeeze and twist in her chest and resumes eating her lunch.

Eleanor's words continue to repeat through her brain for the rest of the day, despite her efforts to suffocate them. But they come back in full force when she ends up at Ben's house after school—as usual—to work on their project. 

That's the only reason she starts noticing the things she does, or, at least, that's what she tells herself. 

It starts off small, with Ben handing her a pen just a moment before hers runs out of ink—like usual, but she never remembers to pack an extra.

_How did he know exactly when her pen was about to run out?_

Eleanor’s words persist in her head, but she brushes this occurrence off, maybe Ben just glanced at her notes and saw that her hand-writing was fading, the ink becoming less clear. That’s a perfectly logical explanation, right?

“You seem happier today,” he says after a few more minutes of silent note-taking.

“What?”

“You seem a lot happier than you were last night at my party,” Ben says. “It suits you.”

Devi beams at him. “I am,” she replies, feeling even more pleased he noticed her change in demeanour. “I made up with El and Fab at lunch."

Ben smiles back, his grin taking over his entire face. “I knew you could do—” He cuts himself off with a cough.

Devi blinks at him. “What was that?”

He clears his throat and then smirks. “I said I knew you were capable of being nice to some people, David.”

Devi glances at Ben in alarm as he returns to his work. 

He can’t possibly remember the time she opened up to him, can he? The time she told him how much she missed her friends. The time he was comforting and reassuring and surprisingly sweet and the only thing she could bring herself to do in appreciation was hug him.

(Many of the moments of her repeats—her failed attempts to woo Paxton, her boring assigned homework and lessons—are a blur, but each and every conversation with Ben is crystal clear.)

He can’t possibly remember _that_ because he’s not trapped in the same time loop she is. There’s no way he is. He can’t be. 

But as she stares at Ben without a care in the world, Eleanor’s words from lunch continue to ring through her head. _Have you ever considered it might be Ben?_

Before today, the answer to that question would have easily been a resounding no, but now, Devi fears she no longer knows the answer.

* * *

From the fifty-third to sixty-third September 23rds, Devi focuses on the little details.

She perfects her apology to Eleanor and Fabiola, transforming it from a rambling mess into something coherent, but even once she gets it right she doesn’t repeat the same apology every day, she doesn’t want to cheapen its meaning. 

She tries to be a bit less obvious about being caught in a time loop and only admits this to Eleanor three out of ten times, mostly to see if her reaction changes.

It doesn’t. Every single time Eleanor mentions Ben and Devi fixates on the little things more than before.

It starts with a pen just as hers is about to run out of ink, an extra charger right before her laptop dies, a glass of water before she even mentions that she’s thirsty.

On her fifty-eighth September 23rd, he offers to help her with a particularly challenging chemistry problem—that she had asked him about the repeat before—before she even turns to ask him.

On her sixtieth September 23rd, they’re sitting on the couch, and he moves just before she chooses to stretch her legs to get more comfortable. 

The way he anticipates her needs before she even knows what they are is slightly uncanny. 

(It’s not that unusual though, looking back on it, he has always been attentive to her needs. It’s as though Devi is a sunflower and Ben is the sun, she turns to him for help, only to find he’s been there all along.)

Ben knowing what she wants and needs is usual, ordinary, expected, so she shoves down Eleanor’s suggestion again and again. Ben Gross isn’t her soulmate, he’s just weirdly a lot nicer and more caring than she thought.

* * *

It takes Devi until the sixth-fourth September 23rd to really start connecting with Ben.

The school day is the same, her classes are boring and tedious, she makes amends with Eleanor and Fabiola, and as usual, she ends up at Ben’s house after school to start their history project. Today, they’re on the couch rather than seated at his kitchen island. 

Devi groans as she shuts her history textbook.

Ben glances over at her in concern. “What’s wrong?” 

Devi pinches the bridge of her nose. “I hate homework.” 

It feels even more meaningless doing the same homework exercises sixty-four repeats later when she knows all her work will be erased the next day. Balancing the same twenty chemical equations and doing stoichiometric calculations with them sixty-four times can be pretty mind-numbing. When Devi shuts her eyes, she can still see the same neutralization reactions floating in front of her, as if they’ve imprinted themselves into her brain.

Ben snorts, shutting his textbook. “Not an unpopular opinion, David.”

“Shut up!” Devi whacks him in the chest with the back of her palm. “I just miss when we were kids and didn’t have to do all this work, you know?” She sighs, wistfully staring off into the distance. “I miss getting my face painted at the carnival and playing hopscotch on the sidewalk.”

When Ben doesn’t say anything, she turns back to find him slightly hunched over. She pokes him to get his attention. “Hey,” she says and finally looks up at her. “You okay?”

Ben nods his head before turning his gaze back to the ground. “I’m fine,” he says, but with his sullen tone, Devi doesn’t believe him one bit.

“You’re a terrible liar,” she says, rolling her eyes. “Your bad mood is annoying, Gross, but whatever it is, I’m sure you can get over it.” She drums her fingers against her textbook. “Come on, don’t you miss being a kid?" 

Ben lets out a brittle laugh. “I don’t know what to tell you, David, I don’t know too much about that.”

“What do you mean?”

“Forget it.” He shakes his head and scoffs. “You wouldn’t care.”

Devi frowns at him, noting the way he seems to have wilted back onto the couch like a flower whose stem has been bent. “I do care, Ben. Come on, you can talk to me. What’s wrong?”

Ben lets out a shaky deep breath, and finally, his blue, blue eyes meet hers. He looks more hurt, more lonely, more heartbroken than she's ever seen him. When she looks into his eyes, she finally understands the phrase “feeling blue,” and finally understands why the colour blue is so often associated with impermeable sadness. “Sorry,” he starts, “I just… I never did any of that stuff as a kid.”

“Why?”

“I didn’t really have a childhood,” he admits carefully, clasping his hands together in his lap.

Devi opens her mouth to say something, but then she shuts it, nodding her head to signal to Ben that he can keep talking. She wants him to know that she’s willing to listen to him uninterrupted.

He takes a shuddery deep breath. “My parents, even when I was really little, were barely around,” he says quietly. “I had to grow up super fast and learn to take care of myself. I always had to be more mature because I knew they would leave me behind without a second thought.” He shakes his head. “It’s fine though. I’m used to it.”

Devi reaches out to pry his hands apart. “It’s not fine,” she asserts. She takes one of his hands in her own and threads their fingers together. “God, Ben,” she breathes. “You deserved so, so much better than that.”

“You really believe that?” Ben asks quietly.

Devi nods her head. “I do,” she affirms. “I really do.”

She suddenly wants to relive her childhood more than anything, not only for herself, but for Ben. She wants to give him what he missed out on, with his hand in hers.

“But what if I never got a childhood because I didn’t deserve one?” Ben’s eyes shine with tears, but he blinks them back, and it makes Devi physically ache. She wants viscerally to take his pain away, to hold him in her arms, to let his sorrow bleed into her. 

“You deserve better,” Devi says, continuing to trace circles on the back of his hand with her thumb. “I promise you, Ben, you deserve better.”

Ben laughs wryly. “If anyone should think I deserve what I got, it's you. Why do you think I deserve better? You really hated me." 

“I never hated you,” Devi admits. She takes a deep breath. “I think sniping at you and insulting you was more habitual than anything else. Did you ever hate me?”

Ben inhales sharply, the way an engine or motor does before it runs out of fuel, and then shakes his head. “No, I didn’t.”

Devi tightens her grip on his hand. “No one deserves to think their parents don’t love them, least of all you, Ben. You have such a big heart, and you deserve, more than anything, someone who puts you first again and again.”

She wants so badly to hold Ben in her arms, to take this pain away from him and carry it instead. She aches to hug him, aches to touch him, aches to wrap her arms around him and just breathe with him, but she _can’t_. 

She still has a soulmate. A perfect person who she belongs with, to whom she owes faithfulness, who she is supposed to find.

(What if she’s already found him again and again? What if it’s Ben? What if he’s her soulmate?)

Devi scoffs internally. Those thoughts are nothing more than wishful, deluded thinking. It can’t possibly be Ben. It can’t be.

(Then why, so badly, does she wish it is him? Why does she only ache for tomorrow to come if it's a tomorrow by his side?) 

A tucked-away part of her hopes she never finds out who her soulmate is, because if it’s not Ben, does that mean she would lose him?

(She wouldn’t survive that. Ben has always been there for her, she wouldn’t survive having him ripped away. He is a constant the same way Devi knows two binary stars orbit one another, tethered to each other’s gravitational pull. Maybe that’s what they are, two binary stars: appearing close together in the night sky, wholly dependent on one another, but in reality, boundlessly distant, evolving separately, torn apart by the cosmos themselves.)

Losing him is worse than a lifetime, worse than infinity, stuck in this time loop.

(Losing Ben is more dangerous than a ship at sea losing the wind because the wind is what gives it the energy to sail. But pulling him closer is equal in danger, for the wind births storms, hurricanes, and tornados, forces of devastation. She’s caught in an endless limbo where she cannot bear to push him away, but she cannot dare to draw him in.)

So she remains sitting with his hand in hers, hoping all she can bring herself to give is comfort enough.

* * *

As she lives through the next ten September 23rds, she realizes she barely remembers the first 50 of her repeats. Everything blurs together—her attempts to get Paxton, the same homework she can now get through in twenty minutes flat, the boring lessons she's heard over and over again. 

Yet somehow, the moments with Ben and Eleanor and Fabiola stick in her memory. They’re precious moments she holds onto. They don't blur together, but they don't painfully stick out either. They're like flowers in a meadow, both beautiful in their individuality, and as a whole. 

And every day, Ben opens up to her more and more, and every day she takes one of his hands in her own, longing, longing, _longing_ to do more—to pull him impossibly closer—but unable to take the plunge.

* * *

On the seventy-first September 23rd, Ben’s hand is already extended, palm up when she reaches to take it.

Usually, his hands are clasped together in his lap, and she is forced to pry them apart before she can take his hand. 

Today, it is as if he already knew exactly what was going to do. 

She stares at their joined hands for a moment before she finally wills herself to look into his eyes. 

His eyes are so blue, impossibly, brilliantly blue, like the Earth from space. She remembers reading that even the land of the Earth appears blue, the oceans so devastatingly cerulean they overpower continents. Ben’s eyes are the same, so blue they overpower everything else in her vision.

Devi Vishwakumar appreciates certainties, it’s why she so often clings to scientific facts because science does not lie. Science is cold, sometimes calculated, but always, always certain. A lack of certainty, of stability, is why she struggles with emotions.

The only straight forward emotion is anger. It announces itself and its intentions without any hesitation or uncertainty. That’s why anger is Devi’s default when she is hurt, it is the easiest thing to identify and piece out, the easiest way for her to communicate. 

But fear, and grief, and heartbreak, those are things she won’t touch with a thirty-five-foot pole because she cannot pick them apart and study them to understand them the same way she does anger. 

Emotions are the most uncertain thing she knows, and they can never be the 100% she needs. They cannot be examined under a microscope, cannot be broken down and studied, cannot be pulled apart and put back together again, not in the way Devi needs to feel safe, to allow herself to be vulnerable

Looking into Ben’s eyes, Devi thinks she feels what Apollo astronauts felt when they were lifting off into space, 99% certain they were safe, 1% unsure. Pure momentum is what launched them into the cosmos, and right now, she wishes she had that same pure momentum, to launch herself into his arms. But it is that 1%—that 1% of her that feels she will fall into the icy emptiness of a pitch-black sky instead of the embrace of a star—that holds her back. 

That 1% uncertainty is reinforced, further cemented by this: if Ben really is her soulmate, if he has been caught in this time loop with her all along, then why hasn’t he said anything?

(Part of Devi knows that Ben is waiting for _her_. He is doing what he has always done, waiting for her so they can tumble off the ledge into freefall together, rather than yanking her over before she is ready. It’s endlessly stupid, but she wishes for once that he could be slightly more selfish. She needs someone to push her over before she is ready, because she fears she never will be.)

If he was caught in this loop, he would tell her, right? 

(Devi is reminded now of Occam's razor—of the principle of maximum parsimony—that the simplest explanation is the most likely to be true. When she was a kid, she thought this was a literal razor, one that was sharp, metallic, serrated, able to cut and cause her harm. When she looks at Ben, looks at this situation she has wound up in, she struggles to determine which explanation is better. And that is because it is both. The simple explanation—the idea that he, Ben, her soulmate has been in front of her this whole time, that he is caught in this time loop with her—can actually hurt her. But the more complex she makes things, the further she separates herself from her explanation—that Ben anticipates her needs because he knows her, that she’s reading into things, that she’s fixating too much on little details—the less painful, less weighty it is.) 

In situations like this, usually, Devi is the first to run, to escape the things she fears at breakneck speed. And usually, running from Ben is instinctual, it’s what she does whenever she feels them getting too close. She’s even justified every time she runs, every time she abandons him, because he won’t remember. But if he is her soulmate, then running from him will hurt him. Running from Ben, Devi realizes, is a double-edged sword, because running not only hurts him, but it hurts her too. Devi doesn't want any more space between them, but sometimes, she thinks she needs that space to breathe. 

(He has always taken her breath away. Yet all at once, when she is with him she can breathe so much more easily.)

Fight or flight, Devi remembers, are the two most common responses to fear. The sympathetic nervous system triggers a flash flood of hormones to get your heart pumping, sending oxygen everywhere and making your pupils dilate.

(She remembers that these are also physical responses to attraction.)

But there’s also a third response Devi remembers reading about: freeze. It didn’t make any sense to her at the time; how could you freeze in the face of danger? Wouldn’t you be forced to react in some way or another?

But there’s no other way to describe this limbo she and Ben are caught in, this day they both keep reliving. That 1% uncertainty kicks her nervous system into overdrive, fills her bloodstream with adrenaline, norepinephrine, and a surge of other hormones she can’t name. 

She’s paralyzed by fear. She can’t pull him closer, and she can’t push him away, all she can do is sit still, his hand in hers, feeling the pounding of her heart as it hammers against her chest.

* * *

Her epiphany isn’t spurred by something significant, not really, but it’s something significant to _her_.

It’s the eighty-sixth September 23rd, her eighty-sixth day trapped in this time loop, the eighty-sixth day she shivers when she steps into Ben’s foyer.

But as she looks up to make a quip about the temperature, Ben’s hand brushes hers, and she sees a bundle tucked into his arms.

A hoodie.

He’s offering her a hoodie before she even mentioned that she’s cold.

This, she realizes, looking into his eyes, this is the 1% she needed.

It’s Ben. It’s _al_ _ways_ been Ben.

He’s been right in front of her all along.

She spent so many days thinking Paxton was her soulmate, that this whole thing had started because he had kissed her. But it wasn’t all about the person she kissed but rather the person she didn’t.

Ben had tried to kiss her that night, and she had turned him down, twice, and that she realizes was how this whole thing started. It was why she couldn’t stop thinking about his laughter and the way he smiled that night, why she couldn’t stop thinking about that half-way hopeful look she caught in his eyes. 

(Why he brought up the attempted kiss the first two repeats she lived through, he had known all along.)

It seems so obvious now that it’s Ben, that it’s always been Ben. So painfully, beautifully obvious. He is, in every sense of the word, her constant. He is her polar star, a fixed point in her forever spinning chaotic world; he is the person who has always, always, _always_ kept her grounded.

She might not be certain quite yet what she feels for him, how she feels about him, but what she’s learned is this: nothing about emotions is certain, sometimes you just have to take the plunge and tumble into freefall. And perhaps, the uncertainty, the confusion, the chaos of it is the most beautiful thing of all.

“Ben,” she finally says, voice shaking like a willow tree swaying violently in the breeze. She realizes that their hands are no longer just brushing, but that he is holding her hands in his own. “Are you reliving this day?" 

He doesn’t even speak, he just nods, but it’s all the confirmation she needs.

Devi has always loved the stars, and she knows that the Earth appears bluer from space. This is because of the atmosphere—the layers of nitrogen, oxygen, and ozone—between the infinity of the cosmos and the boundless sea. She thought Ben's eyes would be the same, made bluer by the space between them, made bluer by their distance, but, as she looks into his eyes now, she realizes she was wrong. They are still as vividly blue as ever, if not more so, and Devi is so, so glad because she will never put space between them again.

She isn’t sure which one of them moves first, or who moves quicker, but like a rocket thrust into liftoff, she launches herself into his arms, and he catches her instantly. She hugs him suffocatingly tightly, burying her head in the crook of his neck, and he reciprocates with equal force.

(She isn’t surprised by this, she and Ben have always been each other’s equals.) 

He is so warm and so steady and so stable, and he is here, and he is holding her, and right now, he is all she needs. She breathes him in the way she’s wanted to for days, for more repeats than she would care to count. Her heart thunders rapid-fire in her chest, and she can feel his heart thumping in equal time.

Usually, the force of gravity, the most prevalent force in the universe, holds her and Ben apart, keeps them separated by light-years. But today, she and Ben overcome the gravity that has kept them isolated, instead they are pushed together, they are united by an even stronger force: electromagnetism.

(Devi remembers Coulomb's law, which states that opposite forces attract and like forces repel. She supposes she and Ben are just like that, while their vast similarities—their inability to handle emotions and their stubbornness—should keep them forever apart, it is their differences, their complementary, compatible, harmonious differences, that instead push them together.) 

After what feels like infinity in his arms, Devi pulls back just a small amount, keeping her arms around his neck, relieved when his arms remain around her waist.

“Why didn’t you say anything?” she gasps. 

She can finally read him, she finally recognizes the emotion in his eyes as he looks at her, fondness, fondness, endless amounts of affection. “You needed time, and I didn’t want to push you,” Ben says, thumb moving to stroke her cheek. 

_Time._

The realization hits her like a bolt of lightning, like a devastating explosion. Oh god, she made him wait so, so long. 

He watched her leave fifty times—fifty fucking times—to chase someone else. Oh my god, what has she done?

She only notices that she’s crying when she feels warm tear tracks on her cheeks and watches Ben’s face fall with concern. “Hey,” he whispers, thumb brushing the tears from her eyes. “What’s wrong?” 

“Ben.” Her chest heaves. “I am so, so, sorry.” She takes a shuddery deep breath. “I left you,” she sobs, “I left you so many times to pursue someone else, I don’t know how you could possibly forgive me.”

“You didn’t know,” he reassures her, hands moving to cup her cheeks.

“I’m so, so, sorry.”

Ben leans in pressing a gentle but firm kiss to her forehead. “Devi,” he says, continuing to wipe tears from her eyes. “You couldn’t possibly have known.” He kisses her forehead again. “It hurt,” he admits. “It hurt a lot, but you didn’t mean to hurt me, Devi, I know that.”

“But I still did,” Devi sniffles. She knows she looks like a wreck right now, but Ben looks at her as if she is anything but. He looks at her—eyes filled with affection and warmth—like she is the most precious thing in the universe, like she is his entire universe.

.(And well, as his soulmate, perhaps she is. Perhaps, when Ben looks at her, every star, constellation, and galaxy truly does reside in her eyes.) 

“That’s what happens when you have someone who cares about you. I would rather care about you and get hurt than not care about you at all.” He smooths his thumb against her cheekbone. “You care about me, right?”

Devi nods her head. “I do.” 

“That means I can hurt you,” Ben says quietly. “But would you rather not care about me?”

Devi shakes her head, the tears continuing to flow. “No.”

Ben smiles at her soft and gentle. “I forgive you, Devi.”

Devi offers a watery smile back and nods her head before she presses into him again, wrapping her arms around him as tight as she can, determined to not waste even one more second of the infinity they have together.

* * *

Falling in love with Ben is like crossing the Rubicon.

It’s a point of no return, something she cannot turn back from. It’s like fire burning a piece of paper, a sequence of events that once set into motion, cannot be undone or reversed. It’s an irreversible chemical reaction, a spontaneous, rapid process that requires no further energy input. 

(And that should be so, so scary, any other version of Devi would think so, but instead, it just feels _right_.) 

Falling in love with him is the easiest thing she’s ever done.

Perhaps, that's why she's where she is right now: in all of the other repeats, Devi has been in math class, at this exact time, listening to her teacher drone on and on about trigonometric identities, a lesson she's heard so many times she has it memorized. 

Instead, she's laying her head on Ben's chest while they watch a movie, listening to the beat of his heart. His arm is wrapped around her shoulder, his hand is in hers, and their fingers are intertwined. It's the safest place she's ever known.

He lifts their joined hands up to press a swift kiss to her knuckles, and Devi, against her better judgement, giggles. “What?” Devi asks, tilting her head up so she can look into his spectacularly blue eyes. From this angle, she can see that they’re not just a single shade, but an explosion of colour. Slightly darker, cobalt around his pupil, surrounded by a lighter shade of azure. She finally understands why blue is so often associated with serenity, looking into Ben’s eyes she feels more at peace than she’s ever been.

“I can’t believe you used your feminine wiles to get me to skip class,” he mumbles.

“You’ve heard those lessons eighty-six times, Ben.” Devi smacks him in the chest with the back of her palm. “And how did I use my feminine wiles three days in a row, huh? This is the third September 23rd we’ve skipped.” 

He laughs and pressed this close to him, Devi feels the sound reverberate in her chest. “I stand by what I said.”

Devi rolls her eyes fondly, then snuggles in closer. Her body tucks into Ben’s the way she imagines gears do in a clock tower, settling next to one another and filling the spaces left behind; her head is tucked into the crook of his neck, his arm is wrapped around her shoulder, their legs tangled together. They fit together, and they work, just like the cogs in a clock.

A few beats of easy tranquillity stretch between them, the only background noise a long-forgotten movie, before Ben speaks again. “Can I ask you something?”

Devi hums in contentment as he continues to trace lazy circles on her side. 

“When did you start to think it could be me?”

Devi doesn’t move her head from where it’s nestled into the crook of his neck, so when she speaks her breath ghosts his skin. “The fifty-second repeat,” she murmurs.

He drops a kiss into her hair. “Why then?”

“That was the first time I made up with Eleanor and Fabiola,” she answers. “I came back here to work on our project as always, and when I told you about it you said, “I knew you could do it,” and that was the first time I started to consider it. 

“I did not say that,” Ben objects. “I cut myself off.”

“Okay, fine,” Devi concedes. “You didn’t say exactly that, but I knew that was what you were going to say.” She gently presses her lips to his shoulder.

“Yeah, well, you do know me.” He rhythmically taps each of her knuckles with his pointer finger

Devi snorts. “One of my many talents.”

“Hmm,” Ben hums, scattering a few kisses into her hair. “Of which you have an endless amount.” 

Devi smirks. “Glad you finally agree.”

“Don’t push it, David.”

“What about you?” Devi asks, tilting her head up to face him more fully. “When did you start to consider it?”

“I think since the second day. You asked me if we’d already been assigned that project by Mr. Shapiro, and I had, so that was when I knew.”

Devi’s eyes widen. “That soon? Why didn’t you say anything?”

“I already told you,” Ben says, running a hand down her arm. “I didn’t want to push you.” 

“But pushing me is what you do,” Devi asserts. “That’s one of the reasons why we work. We push each other.”

“It is,” Ben agrees. “But this wasn’t something I could push you about, you had to figure it out and make this choice on your own.” They begin to play a gentle tug of war with their joined hands, swinging them through the air. 

“And if I had never figured it out?” Devi counters. “What would you have done then?”

“Not possible. You’re too smart for that.” He presses another kiss into her hair. She can hear the smirk in his voice. “Not as smart as I am, obviously, but too smart for that.” 

“No, I’m definitely smarter as you.”

“Then why did it take you eighty-six days to get us here?” Ben teases. 

Devi presses feather-light kisses to his jaw, his cheek, the corner of his mouth. “Don’t get a big head, Gross. It took you eighty-six days too.”

Ben tightens his arm around her. “You know the chances of this happening were statistically improbable.”

Devi snorts. “Of course you’re bringing that up right now.”

“I’m serious,” Ben says. “We live in a world with more than seven billion people, which means there are more than seven billion people out there that could be your soulmate. Most of those people with whom we’ll never even interact. Furthermore, most people don’t even find their soulmate until they’re in their twenties. The chance of us finding our soulmate at fifteen years old, the chance of it being someone we’ve known all along, is mathematically infinitesimal.”

“You’re right,” Devi sighs, tilting up her head to scatter another few kisses on his jaw. “But we’ve always been good at defying the odds, you and I.” She chuckles softly. “After all, I’m here.”

She looks up at Ben, finding his blue eyes blazing with fondness. 

Devi wishes she could describe the affection in his eyes, wishes she could better describe the way he looks at her, but every description she can come up with still pales in comparison. 

(Yet she still tries. Ben no longer looks at Devi as though she is a distant star, planetary nebula, or galaxy, because she is not light-years away, yet he doesn’t look at her like a piece of art either. The way one looks at art—though filled with love—is slightly detached, slightly disconnected. No, he looks at her the way one looks at their favourite food or favourite novel. Like she is something he can cherish, something he can adore, something he can treasure. In his eyes, she’s no longer ephemeral, she’s everlasting.)

“Yeah,” he agrees. “You are.”

He presses a firm, lingering kiss to her forehead before drawing back and touching his forehead to hers.

(She realizes that sometimes, you cross the point of no return to a better side, and being with Ben is one of the best places she has ever been.)

* * *

The ninety-second September 23rd finds Devi sitting on Ben’s couch, once more tucked into his side. His arm is wrapped around her waist, and he’s tracing lazy patterns on her knee.

They’d both gone to school that day; Ben because he didn’t want his brain to atrophy, and Devi agreeing to join him because she couldn’t have him getting even a slight advantage in their academic rivalry. She’d taken the time to make up with Eleanor and Fabiola, careful not to bring up soulmates or the time loop, she wanted her apology to be focused on her friends, not her. 

After school, she and Ben ended up at his house to work on Mr. Shapiro’s history project, but decided against working on it in favour of watching a movie.

Of course, now that she has Ben, Devi isn't sure she'll ever pay attention to a movie again. Especially not when five minutes into the movie, he slung his arm around her shoulders and tucked her into his side, naturally, as if it was something they had done a thousand times before. She got a bit distracted after that.

A nearly empty popcorn bowl rests on Devi’s lap as the credits of the long-forgotten movie roll in the background. “Well, that was entertaining,” she mumbles. 

“Entertaining?” Ben asks incredulously. “Do you even remember what we were watching?”

Devi feels her cheeks heat up, and ducks her head into his shoulder, before pressing a kiss to his collarbone. She pokes her head up to look at Ben and finds his expression is expectant. “No,” she murmurs. 

“Too distracted by my good looks, David?” Ben teases.

To his credit, Ben is right. Devi knows she spent the entire duration of the film, toying with their joined hands, nestling closer into his side, and just breathing him in, but she won’t admit that to him.

Devi affectionately rolls her eyes and shoves him playfully. “You're incorrigible.”

Ben smirks. “Is that the best adjective you can think of?”

“I was also thinking irritating.” She begins to count off her points on her fingers. “Irksome, tiresome, troublesome.” She wiggles an eyebrow. “Vexatious.”

“Oof.” Ben tightens his arm around her and gives her a look signalling mock offence. “How long did it take you to come up with that one?”

“All of a minute, Gross, you know I have an extensive vocabulary. It’s one of my defining characteristics.” She smirks back. “Yours is being a pretentious dick.”

“Hmm,” Ben hums, eyes twinkling with mirth. “You love it though.”

He presses another kiss into her hair, and Devi sighs in contentment. “Yeah, I do.”

Ben smirks at her again—that formerly infuriating, now irresistibly charming smirk—then gets up off the couch, and Devi grumbles at his sudden absence. 

“Can’t have you getting too clingy, David,” he says as he steps away.

Devi scowls in his direction, immediately missing his warmth, but then he returns moments later, holding a glass of water.

Devi accepts the glass, her hands shaking, and takes a sip, as Ben takes a seat on the opposite end of the couch. She sets the glass down on the floor and looks up at him, well aware that the smile crossing her face is stupidly smitten.

But she can’t help it, here again, is Ben anticipating her needs before she even knows what they are. Not in the strange, uncanny way he did before she knew he was her soulmate, but because he knows her, because he cares about her, because he loves her. 

And she is beyond certain that she loves him too.

She watches a smirk bloom across his face and suppresses the urge to trace his dimples with her finger. “A life sequestered as your errand boy, David? I think I’m destined for more than that.”

Devi smirks in return. “Yeah, work hard and maybe, just maybe, I’ll promote you in the future.”

Ben laughs, bright and clear, tipping his head back. Ben’s laugh makes her feel like falling back into bed after a long day, pure bliss and joy and comfort. It stirs up a myriad of emotions all melted together. It makes her feel like she’s finally safe, finally home. Finally ready to embrace a future by his side.

Before she can second guess her decision, she scoots across the couch, cups his face in both hands, and presses her lips to his. She pulls away after only a second to find Ben staring at her, eyes slightly wide and mouth agape.

“Devi,” he whispers, voice filled with hopeful disbelief.

Devi smooths her thumb over his cheekbone. “I think I’m ready." 

Ben’s eyes blow even wider. “You’re ready?”

Devi nods her head. “Yeah. I’m ready to start tomorrow with you.”

Ben tips forward, pressing his forehead to hers. “You’re sure?” he asks, breath ghosting her lips.

Devi slides her hand down to cup his jaw. “It’s a little too late for that, Gross, I did kiss you.” She smiles softly at him. “I’m sure.

Ben’s eyes seem to dawn in understanding, and moments later, he’s reaching for her, pulling her close, and finally, blissfully kissing her.

His lips against hers are soft, impossibly soft, but his mouth slants against hers hard, determined, hungry. One of his hands threads into her hair while the other rests against her neck, the pad of his thumb pressing into her pulse point, and she wonders if he can feel how fast her heart is pounding, beating out his name over and over again. _Ben, Ben, Ben, Ben._

She slides a hand down his neck to tug him closer by the collar of his shirt, parting her lips as she deepens the kiss. Her other hand rests on his chest, feeling the beat of his heart, in tandem with hers.

Ben's hands are impossibly warm, and his mouth pressed against hers is not everything she thought it would be, it's _better_. He is everything she never knew she wanted, everything she needed. She slides a hand up to run through his hair, so damn soft, and wonders if it is possible to tug him closer because even while kissing him, she doesn't feel like she's close enough. She wonders if she ever will.

When Ben kisses her, it’s not fireworks— it’s not the colourful, beautiful explosion she expected—it’s a steadily burning hearth. It’s a fireplace that warms and soothes her very soul, the steady constant burning of a stellar core undergoing nuclear fusion. Because love isn’t explosive or destructive, like a supernova or a gamma-ray burst, it’s stabilizing. Steadying. It’s building a life together, building a home. It’s the promise of tomorrow.

He kisses her like they have all the time in the world, and for once, Devi thinks, they do. But even all the time in the world wouldn’t be enough for her. It wouldn’t be enough time to inhale the sandalwood scent of his cologne, wouldn’t be enough time to sigh and pull him impossibly closer as he sweeps his tongue into her mouth, wouldn’t be enough time to melt into him, for the rest of the world to fade away.

When he eventually draws away from her, it takes everything in Devi to not pull him back to her, to kiss him again and again and again ad infinitum until her lips bruise. Ben seems reluctant to let her go as well, his hand lingers, cupping her cheek as a soft smile curls over his lips.

Devi doesn’t even realize what she’s saying until the words tumble out.

“I love you.”

The soft smile on Ben’s face morphs into a smirk. “Wow, I’m that good of a kisser?”

Devi’s lips tilt up into a matching smirk. “Oh, you thought it was because of your kissing?” She tosses her hair over her shoulder and laughs. “No, Gross, it’s because of your money.”

His eyes glint with intrigue. “So you’re a gold digger, huh?”

“Yes,” Devi says. “Yes, I am.”

Ben cocks his head. “Well, you’re not very good at it, since you _fell in love_ with me.”

Devi swats at him. “You’re such an ass,” she pouts. “I hate you.”

His smirk only grows. “Considering you just told me _you love me_ , I don’t think you do.”

Devi scowls, shifting out of his arms, but Ben tugs her back towards him. “Hey, no, Devi.” His smirk melts back into the soft smile he reserves for her and his thumb scores across her cheek. “I love you too.”

Devi breathes out a sigh of relief and leans up to kiss him. After a brief moment, she draws back, but only enough to tuck herself into his arms. She rests her head in the crook of his neck and wraps her arms around his waist, pressing herself as close to him as possible. She takes a moment to breathe him in, falling asleep to the gentle, steady beat of his heart against her own.

* * *

Devi wakes up the morning of September 24th feeling like everything has changed. 

And this time, it has.

Ben is still holding her, and their legs are tangled together. Her nose is tucked into his neck, brushing the underside of his jaw, and his arm is snuggly wrapped around her waist. She can feel the steady rise and fall of his chest as he breathes, his breath ghosting her cheek.

She doesn’t even have to check, he’s still here with her. They’re still here _together_. She already knows. 

“Ben,” she murmurs, flattening her palm against his chest.

He hums, tightening his arm around her waist.

“Ben,” she repeats, poking him between the ribs.

His eyes flutter open, and he rubs the sleep from them. 

“It’s September 24th,” Devi says, smiling widely.

Ben suddenly seems much awake, his eyes appearing clear instead of cloudy. His voice is slightly roughened with sleep. “It’s September 24th?" 

Devi grins even wider and nods her head.

Ben laughs—his delightful, vibrant, beautiful laugh—and pulls Devi even closer, causing her to laugh too, before muffling her laughter with his lips.

It’s not a skillful or a thrilling kiss, and Ben breaks it seconds later, smiling against her mouth.

“We did it,” he whispers, thumb stroking her cheek.

“We did it,” Devi says, knowing her smile is stupidly wide.

He sits up, pulling her with him, so she can tuck herself into his side.

Devi reaches for his hand and threads their fingers together.

“How many days did it take us?”

“Ninety-two,” Devi mumbles, resting her head on his chest, and Ben wraps his other arm around her shoulder.

“Man, David, if you hadn’t wasted so many days thinking someone else was your soulmate we could have been a world record.” He presses a kiss into her hair. “It could have been an accolade we shared.”

“I’m never sharing first place with you, Gross,” she grumbles into his chest, fondly rolling her eyes. “Besides, we still halved the international average of 6 months.”

Ben toys with their joined hands. “What percentile are we in?”

Devi grabs her phone off the table and does a quick google search. “99th.”

“So, we're in the top 1%?” 

Devi smirks, using her free hand to toss her hair over her shoulder. “Yeah. What, is it a weird feeling, Gross? I get it, you're not used to being so high up. That's all me." 

“Again, you’re the one who wasted fifty days, Devi.” He scrunches his face as he pouts. “We could have been a world record.”

Devi snorts. “Being with me is like winning a world record.”

Ben lifts their joined hands to his mouth and presses a swift kiss to her knuckles. He smiles softly at her, that stupid soft smile that makes her heart race in her chest, makes her feel like the world is hers to conquer. “Fine,” he says, stroking her hand. “I love you, and I agree with that.” 

Devi feels her face explode with pink blush and lightly punches him in the chest. “You're such a goddamn sap.”

“Well, we are soulmates.” His eyes glint. “Does this mean you’re gonna beat me up regularly?" 

Devi arches an eyebrow. “Can you take it?"

Ben cocks his head. “I’m jacked, so yes, I can.” She can hear the smirk in his voice. “I’d say being with me is a world record of its own too.”

Devi scoffs. “You’re so conceited." 

Ben pulls her flush against him, eyes dancing with mirth. “And yet, you love me.”

Devi leans up to kiss him, letting him deepen it for only a second before she teasingly draws back. “I do.”

“But seriously,” he reminds her, expression growing earnest, “we could have set a world record.”

Devi shoves him playfully again. “Asshole.” She cups his face in her hands. “Besides, what does it matter? We got here.” 

“Yeah, we did,” Ben agrees. “It doesn’t matter how, but we did,” he says before he’s kissing her again.

And Ben’s right, for when he’s kissing her, Devi no longer cares that it took them ninety-two days, or fifty days longer than necessary, or that they didn’t break any world records, or _how_ they got here. All she cares about is Ben. All she cares about is being with him, her soulmate, here, now, forever.

**Author's Note:**

> Leave a comment if you liked this fic! They make me stupidly happy!


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